Abul Haq Haqiq, who was known to the media as Mohammad Hanif, was arrested in the eastern province of Nangarhar late Monday.

During interrogation he said fugitive Taliban leader Mullah Mohammad Omar, who has a multi-million-dollar bounty on his head, was in the western Pakistan city of Quetta, the Afghan intelligence agency said in a statement.

"He is under the protection of the ISI in Quetta," it quoted Hanif as saying. ISI is Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence agency.

Haqiq was not presented to the media for questioning and the authenticity of the claims could not be verified.

The Afghan intelligence agency, called the National Directorate of Security, said the 26-year-old Haqiq had also said the regular suicide attacks in Afghanistan were plotted in a madrasa (religious school) in Pakistan's Bajaur tribal area.

He also claimed former ISI chief Hamid Gul had financed the attacks and showed propaganda videos against the foreign forces in Afghanistan, the NDS statement said.

Hanif is being held in the eastern city of Jalalabad, near where he was arrested.

Afghanistan and Pakistan have accused each other of sheltering the leaders of the Taliban insurgency and their allies in the al-Qaeda terror network.

Meanwhile, the first joint Afghan, Pakistan and Nato-led force intelligence centre is due to open in Kabul this month in a "significant step" for efforts to defeat the Taliban, an official said yesterday.

Six officers from the Pakistan military are due in the Afghan capital this week to staff the centre, along with six each from the Afghan army and Nato's International Security Assistance Force, an Isaf spokesman said.

The joint intelligence and operation centre would see "officers from Afghanistan, Pakistan and Isaf sitting together here in Kabul, able to talk on a minute-by-minute basis," Major Richard Nugee told reporters.

It was expected to be set up in the next 10 days and would operate from the Isaf headquarters in the city centre.